Herbert Paul Grice - Linguistic Philosopher - Essay Example

The ability to overlook other differences to cooperate conversationally demonstrates itself in several dialogue maxims that we always adhere to. Grice contended that the maxims that govern cooperative conversation are the maxims of quantity, quality, relation, and manner (Korta and Perry 2012). The maxim of quantity is the amount of knowledge that parties involved in the conversation find useful. The maxim of quality is the quality of information conveyed during the conversation and its true or false nature. The maxim of relation is how applicable the information is to the conversation. Lastly, the maxim of manner is placing the information conveyed in the clearest, shortest, and most neat way (Korta and Perry 2012).

Conversational implicature is the sharp differentiation between what a person says and what he or she implies by this statement (Korta and Perry 2012). Grice theorized that one determines a person’s statement by the traditional meaning of the statement and the background processes of disambiguation and reference fitting. This means that what this person implies relates to the existence of some logical values and maxims leading the dialogue. Conversational implicature entails the common identification of implication due to the literal content of a statement, its implied meaning, its non-literal content, and its unintentional message. Read More